Latent Rapist- from for colored girls who have considered suicide/when the rainbow is enough, by Ntozake Shange

A rapist doesn’t have to be a stranger to be legitimate. Someone you never saw. A man with obvious problems. But if you been public with him, danced one dance, kissed him goodbye lightly with a closed mouth, pressing charges will be as hard as keeping your legs closed while five fools try and run a train on you. these men friends of ours who smile nice stay employed and take us out to dinner. lock the door behind you wit fist in face to fuck. who make elaborate mediterranean dinners & let the art ensemble carry all ethical burdens while they invite a coupla friends over to have you, are sufferin from latent rapist bravado & we are left wit the scars. bein betrayed by men who know us & expect like the stranger we always thot waz comin that we will submit we must have known. women relinquish all personal rights in the presence of a man who apparently could be considered a rapist especially if he has been considered a friend & is no less worthy of bein beat witin an inch of his life bein publicly ridiculed havin two fists shoved up his ass. than the stranger we always thot it wd be. who never showed up. cuz it turns out the nature of rape has changed, we can now meet them in circles we frequent for companionship, we see them at the coffeehouse, wit someone else we know, we could even have em over for dinner & get raped in our own houses, by invitation. a friend.